Two-way radio communication has long been the favored means of communicating in organizations like police, public safety, fire response, rescue, and military, as well as some commercial settings such as vehicle fleet and industrial operations. Two-way communication remains popular because it provides nearly immediate communication; when a radio operator presses the transmit button, more well known as “push to talk,” a modem two-way radio device makes a quick check of the channel to ensure it is not in use, and alerts the operator with a “talk permit” sound, whereupon the operator can begin talking and the operator's voice is concurrently transmitted to all other radio devices monitoring the channel. Other two-way radio devices operating on the same channel as a receiving device simply unmute their speaker and play the received audio over the speaker at as volume setting selected by the radio's operator. In this way radio operators do not have to do anything to hear the transmission, assuming they set their radio device's volume at an appropriate level for the ambient conditions.
Modem two-way communication device are designed primarily in two forms; a portable device and a mobile device. The portable device is a battery powered device that can be worn on an operator's body and carried by the operator, and has a small antenna that is coupled directly (typically screwed in) to the portable device. A mobile device is mounted in a vehicle and is coupled to an antenna mounted on the outside of the vehicle, and has a substantially higher transmission power than a portable device. It is common for a given operator to use both a portable and a mobile device. For example, police officers often respond to calls and patrol areas in a vehicle, and will occasionally exit the vehicle to engage in various tasks. While in the vehicle the mobile device is used, and while away from the vehicle the operator relies on the portable device to receive and engage in communications.
Having both a portable and a mobile device can lead to some issues, as well as opportunities. If the mobile and portable are both set to the same channel setting, then the operator must reduce the volume of one device when they are in close proximity since the audio received by the non-transmitting device will feed back into the device being used to transmit. However, having both a portable and a mobile device allow the operator to monitor more channels compared to having only a single two-way radio device. By setting the devices on different channel settings, the feedback issue is avoided, but in some circumstances the portable device may not have a strong enough signal to reliably reach a repeater or other base station so that others can hear the operator speaking on the channel to which the portable device is set.
Accordingly, there is a need for a method and apparatus for allowing collaboration between a portable and mobile two-way radio devices that avoid these problems while allowing the advantages of having access to more than one two-way radio device.
Skilled artisans will appreciate that elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of embodiments of the present invention.
The apparatus and method components have been represented where appropriate by conventional symbols in the drawings, showing only those specific details that are pertinent to understanding the embodiments of the present invention so as not to obscure the disclosure with details that will be readily apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art having the benefit of the description herein.